Pages

Wednesday, 25 July 2012

Turkey Closes All Borders with Syria

The Turkish government is closing all its checkpoints on the Syrian border, Hayati Yazici, Minister of Customs and Trade of the country, said on Wednesday. “All checkpoints along the Syrian border are closed starting today,” the minister was cited by local NTV television as saying. Turkey acted in line with a new package of sanctions against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad imposed by Ankara, the TV channel said. Syrian insurgents have launched frequent attacks in the last few days at its border points, including near the Iraqi border. Turkey has 13 checkpoints on its 900-kilometer border with Syria. The sanctions will cover truck traffic, but not the inflow of refugees from Syria, some 45,000 of whom already fled to Turkey from the ongoing civil war, NTV said. Turkey plans to establish three new refugee camps on the Syrian border, reports said earlier.